Hamilton Sets Fastest Time in Malaysia, on Friday

Lewis Hamilton completed the Friday action on Sepang International Circuit on top of the field, scoring yet another fastest lap during P2 of the Malaysian Grand Prix. The McLaren driver set the pace from the early stages of the session, setting lap times in the vicinity of 1:34 and improving them constantly towards the 30-minute mark.

He eventually stopped the clock at 1:34.175 shortly after the first half an hour of action had passed, but it was no easy feat for the 2008 world champion. While setting the fastest time of the day on the optional soft tire provided by Bridgestone for the 2010 Malaysian GP, Hamilton started complaining about its poor grip from his first laps.

Eventually, all drivers started talking to their team engineers via radio about the poor performances of the soft compound on the Sepang track, reporting wheelspin, understeer and poor stability.

Despite Sebastian Vettel's second quickest time on the Sepang circuit (0.266 seconds slower than Hamilton), Red Bull once again failed to pass the reliability test in a Grand Prix weekend. This time it was Mark Webber's time to play the role of the victim, as he had to stall his car into the gravel some 30 minutes into P2 due to a potential engine problem.

Nico Rosberg again displaced some strong pace in practice with his Mercedes W01, settling for the 3rd quickest time of the day – only 0.002 slower than Vettel. Jenson Button, Michael Schumacher and Robert Kubica followed the leading pack in the time classification, being the only drivers within one second from Hamilton.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso scored the 7th best time of the day after spending the majority of the 90-minute session testing the car's behavior in heavy fuel conditions, his flying lap being recorded on the softer compound with less than 15 minutes to go. The top 10 was completed by Sebastien Buemi, Vitaly Petrov and Adrian Sutil.

01. Lewis Hamilton (McLaren-Mercedes)               1:34.175
02. Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull-Renault)                 1:34.441
03. Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)                                 1:34.443
04. Jenson Button (McLaren-Mercedes)                 1:34.538
05. Michael Schumacher (Mercedes)                      1:34.674
06. Robert Kubica (Renault)                                    1:35.148
07. Fernando Alonso (Ferrari)                                 1:35.581
08. Sebastien Buemi (Toro Rosso-Ferrari)              1:35.660
09. Vitaly Petrov (Renault)                                       1:35.872
10. Adrian Sutil (Force India-Mercedes)                  1:35.957
11. Kamui Kobayashi (Sauber-Ferrari)                     1:36.018
12. Vitantonio Liuzzi (Force India-Mercedes)           1:36.221
13. Pedro de la Rosa (Sauber-Ferrari)                     1:36.325
14. Jaime Alguersuari (Toro Rosso-Ferrari)              1:36.325
15. Felipe Massa (Ferrari)                                         1:36.602
16. Rubens Barrichello (Williams-Cosworth)             1:36.813
17. Nico Hulkenberg (Williams-Cosworth)                 1:37.415
18. Jarno Trulli (Lotus-Cosworth)                               1:38.454
19. Heikki Kovalainen (Lotus-Cosworth)                    1:38.530
20. Mark Webber (Red Bull-Renault)                         1:38.786
21. Timo Glock (Virgin-Cosworth)                              1:39.061
22. Lucas di Grassi (Virgin-Cosworth)                       1:39.158
23. Karun Chandhok (HRT-Cosworth)                       1:41.084
24. Bruno Senna (HRT-Cosworth)                             1:41.481